anything special or weird about changing the pads and rotors on these cars? Or is it a fairly normal and straight forward brake job?

 

Never replaced the rotors, but the pad was no problem. I'm about to change them again today.

 

i'm guessing there is a couple more bolts holding the caliper housing (if that is what it's called) and i'm guessing the rotor is only held on by the lug nuts.

 

Usually yes. Caliper has two bolts holding to the hub, but the rotors are held on lugs sometimes also have a screw on the front or a washer around a stud to keep it in place.

 

Did my brake job today, and got some pics. Ended up changing the rotors because they had a significant lip worn on them. There were nothing hold the rotor on the front, but it would not come off despite me beating the rotor to break up any rust bond. So I watched this YouTube video for a tip. Apparently you screw in two screws to pop the rotor away from the hub. Here's the video of a 09 Camry.


Here's the rotor face.

Here's the bolts I Took out to release the caliper.

Another pic of the caliper bolt on top unscrewed.

Here's a pic of the 1/2 inch bolts I used to free the rotor.

 

Yup, pretty painless. I got lucky and my rotors came right off.